14/09/2013
Mon Ami Seb translated this from the article in L'opinion
This summer’s clothes, this summer’s song, this summer’s holiday destination, this summer’s drink, and while we’re at it why not this summer’s
lunch table!
Ok let’s cut out clothes, songs etc and just stick to this summers lunch table!
I do hope that all of you readers will have some fond memory of this summer; a great meal; a good atmosphere; extraordinary experience even perhaps?
Experiences that are so precious and well lodged in the memory are rarely linked to a culinary performance. This is rare as a great culinary performance usually depends on a human or even something “super-human”.
And talking of “super-human” moments; well I’ve experienced one this summer whilst on holiday in Andalusia. This occurred at the 402nd Kilometre on the main road N432 which links Badajoz to Granada. The “Califat” road, the road of Castles and Re-conquering battles. MY ROAD!!!
There at the exit of a side road, infront of amazing countryside where one sees Granada for the first time there is a petrol station called “Petrol People”.
As with other petrol stations in this region, this one also incorporates a
Bar-Restaurant: “El Penascal”.
By chance we stopped there. It was a sort of “Bagdad Café” moment where the traveller was mysteriously drawn to it.
And it was here that we experienced our “Lunch of the summer” moment.
I am not sure if this site “brings in megabucks”. I can imagine a lot of motorists driving by without seeing it. In any case the people who stop here do not seem to do so “en masse”. The view is stunning but in Andalusia all views are stunning. Motorists have got a lot to do and asking them to stop here is a little ambitious.
Granada is only a few turnings away and other villages on the N432 can justify a stop.
But here there are humans! I actually wanted to say “Aliens from Outer Space” and wanted to believe it……But no….they are humans.
English humans. Almost all of them anyway as one of them is Icelandic.
They found themselves there no doubt following several adventures or no doubt mis-adventures. They look confident, serene, and very slightly “disturbing”. They have clear blue eyes and there’s something about them that I just cannot put my finger on; something troubling but not worrying; a little like hearing of a new planet suddenly existing.
Danielle, (she’s the “Icelandic” one), Malcolm and Rosamund offer the disbelieving travelling a United Kingdom Breakfast! This consists of “Baked Beans”, some fried tomatoes, some soft mushrooms, little piles of potatoes (“hash browns”), some bacon, a sausage, a fried egg, and even some “black pudding”!
Enter Haggis and “Morcilla from Andalusia”. I added some ketchup, as recommended. Then I spread butter on some toasted sliced bread; “si senor” baked beans with ketchup! Whilst watched by my amazed friends from Andalusia.
We then began a conversation with Danielle and Malcolm whose Spanish accents remind one vividly of John Cleese in Fawlty Towers when he talks to Manuel.
We shot the breeze with our friends for about an hour before getting back on the road.
The next night we came back and I offered Danielle and Malcolm a little “Orujo” which is a sort of Grappa, which is something that “flirts” with a 70 degrees alcohol; which was given to me by a friend an hour earlier.
Malcolm certainly appreciated it, and Danielle did me the honour of having a little, although she has stopped drinking for several years now.
I reckon we could easily have finished the bottle and had a few more right to the end of the night. Danielle offered me a “Benedictine Fécamp” and we laughed with “Mucha Emoción”!
I then “filé a l’anglaise”! (translates as “made a dash like an Englishman” – i.e left hurriedly. )
Jean-Bernard Magescas
Thursday 5 September at 13:08
L’Opinion Magazine
